Google publisher ads expanding?

As part of a limited AdSense beta test, Google is offering new types of graphical and interactive advertisements to publishers, according to Jennifer Slegg, the Google AdSense forum moderator at Search Engine Watch.

AdSense is experimenting with interstitials, the full-page ads that come up when you click on a Web page, expanding ads that can be enlarged with a click or mouse-over, and floating ads that drift onto the screen from the side of the page, she wrote in a posting on her blog.

"If AdSense offered rich media to all publishers, it could really hurt competitor companies offering similar rich media ad formats because of the vast number of publishers that AdSense has," she wrote. "In terms of dominating the online advertising market, AdSense rich media could seal the deal to make AdSense the force to be reckoned with, by not only dominating the online text ad and graphical banner-style advertising, but in the entire online advertising market--definitely a story to watch."

A Google representative said the company has nothing to announce at this time.